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07/08/2020
Alegra
3 Reviews
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Alegra
Top Review
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The magic of the moment
only becomes something precious in retrospect. Je reviens has accompanied me all my life. In my childhood the scent of my grandmother, among others like Shalimar, Mitsouko, it was her everyday scent, belonging to her childhood like the scent of chicken soup. Chicken soup is good for the soul, whether a cold, bad grades at school, lovesickness, chicken soup gave comfort in the pubertal desolation. And its warm, flattering aroma, sandalwood, vanilla, violet. I still love violets. After her death, I found 3 unopened boxes of je reviens in her closet. Still in cellophane. She had bought them herself, the price tag was still on the boxes. What am I inferring from that? 60 marks. Exactly 60. Not 59.99 like today. A round figure and a lot of money then. I am sitting in her bedroom, the neighbours are gone, anyone who wanted to have some of her earthly treasures has taken it with them, I open an opened bottle, pat something on my wrist, sniff, I cannot find them in this fragrance. Aldehydes, lemon, some pungent note, tilted?
Disappointed, I continue to pack for Caritas, and for the garbage. And suddenly.... powdery, warm, sweet, it rises from my wrist, the purple violet pastilles that I liked so much, the iris that powders it all, something herbaceous, but only slightly and strangely the scent of her face cream. She is there again, in my heart, embracing me and finally, finally, finally I don't function anymore, but I can cry.
Leap in time: Decades later, the ship of life has carried me through calm waters and through storms. And after a big, wild storm, in which I sometimes thought I would sink, I had finally reached an island. Like Robinson, I set up my life anew.
In this phase I met a man, 35 years older than me, a widower, where I suspected a good fatherly friend, he was looking for a new partner.
Gentlemen of the old school, he invited me to the opera, wrote me old-fashioned letters, gave me some wisdom, tamed my exuberant temperament, and had subtle conversations with me. At Christmas he gave me a bottle of Je reviens, the perfume. I did not mention that I had the old version at home several times, thanked me He told me that it was his late wife's favorite scent and I thought quite heretically: no, yes, it's clear, and the scent of my grandmother.
We never became a couple, but he always remained a fatherly friend to me. Meanwhile he is in another world, in the past, the deeply internalized basic values have remained with him, still, when I visit him in the Seniorenstift, he puts the chair in my place, gives me small charming compliments, and when he enters the local world from time to time, increasingly less often, he is also a pleasant conversation partner. Apart from that, all I can do is listen to him, let him address me with very different names and enter his world, which is so strange to me. But always, really always, when I visit him, he smiles and is happy, this is not the case with all visitors, he can become quite nasty Is it je reviens, this warmth, this sandalwood violet-laden dry warmth? What world does this perfume take him to? Can olfactory memory influence the past more strongly than, say, narratives?
It will probably always be a mystery to us.
But je reviens remains our common secret
Disappointed, I continue to pack for Caritas, and for the garbage. And suddenly.... powdery, warm, sweet, it rises from my wrist, the purple violet pastilles that I liked so much, the iris that powders it all, something herbaceous, but only slightly and strangely the scent of her face cream. She is there again, in my heart, embracing me and finally, finally, finally I don't function anymore, but I can cry.
Leap in time: Decades later, the ship of life has carried me through calm waters and through storms. And after a big, wild storm, in which I sometimes thought I would sink, I had finally reached an island. Like Robinson, I set up my life anew.
In this phase I met a man, 35 years older than me, a widower, where I suspected a good fatherly friend, he was looking for a new partner.
Gentlemen of the old school, he invited me to the opera, wrote me old-fashioned letters, gave me some wisdom, tamed my exuberant temperament, and had subtle conversations with me. At Christmas he gave me a bottle of Je reviens, the perfume. I did not mention that I had the old version at home several times, thanked me He told me that it was his late wife's favorite scent and I thought quite heretically: no, yes, it's clear, and the scent of my grandmother.
We never became a couple, but he always remained a fatherly friend to me. Meanwhile he is in another world, in the past, the deeply internalized basic values have remained with him, still, when I visit him in the Seniorenstift, he puts the chair in my place, gives me small charming compliments, and when he enters the local world from time to time, increasingly less often, he is also a pleasant conversation partner. Apart from that, all I can do is listen to him, let him address me with very different names and enter his world, which is so strange to me. But always, really always, when I visit him, he smiles and is happy, this is not the case with all visitors, he can become quite nasty Is it je reviens, this warmth, this sandalwood violet-laden dry warmth? What world does this perfume take him to? Can olfactory memory influence the past more strongly than, say, narratives?
It will probably always be a mystery to us.
But je reviens remains our common secret
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